


An Alternate Continuity

by ChocolateChipMaster



Category: Xenoblade Chronicles
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Basically if Colony 9 Stuff had gone differently, Blood and Injury, For the sake of Spoilers, Gen, Literally the first half of this is Zanza being annoyed, Most characters here are only mentioned in passing and won't be important until later, Roleswap, Xenoblade Chronicles Spoilers, no I will not elaborate
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-07
Updated: 2020-10-07
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:21:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26872861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChocolateChipMaster/pseuds/ChocolateChipMaster
Summary: -CONTAINS MASSIVE SPOILERS FOR XENOBLADE CHRONICLES-There was something to be said about the unpredictability of the future.It was fickle, everchanging. The future Zanza saw was never set in stone, there were endless possibilities. It was what he designed, after all. He gave the Homs the freedom to choose, the freedom to feel. That applied to everyone - including his vessel.And, Zanza thought, mildly irked as he and Shulk lay with one leg dangling precariously off the edge of the platform, he wondered why he’d chosen such arecklessvessel.(Title is a work in progress)
Relationships: Shulk & Zanza (Xenoblade Chronicles)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 27





	An Alternate Continuity

**Author's Note:**

> Finally decided to migrate this AU from tumblr to AO3! A few things have been changed, things have been edited to better fit what I want to write. Enjoy! 
> 
> This isn't beta-read so all mistakes are on me!

There was something to be said about the unpredictability of the future. 

It was fickle, everchanging. The future Zanza saw was never set in stone, there were endless possibilities. It was what he designed, after all. He gave the Homs the freedom to choose, the freedom to feel. That applied to everyone - including his vessel. 

Shulk, who was ever so decisive and driven, couldn’t stand the vision he saw in the Monado. Against all odds, tapping into the unknown strength dwelling within him, he rose to his feet. He screamed Fiora’s name. He took the attack meant for her. 

And, Zanza thought, mildly irked as he and Shulk lay with one leg dangling precariously off the edge of the platform, he wondered why he’d chosen such a  _ reckless  _ vessel. 

Shulk had charged forward, breaking the paralysis by sheer force of will. He'd lunged in the way, causing Metal Face's claws to pierce him instead of her. Zanza remembered feeling a prick of agony (he was a god, after all, trivial things like pain didn't bother him) and he'd been flung to the side, skidding dangerously close to the edge that led into the lake below. Should they fall, their body would surely be picked apart by Piranhaxes within the hour. Zanza couldn't help but cringe - an embarrassing end for his vessel if there ever was one. 

Shulk’s grip was beginning to slack on the Monado. Zanza could feel the life slipping through his fingers. That would not do. Zanza did not have the strength to latch onto another soul. He’d used most of the energy he’d obtained from the expedition team to fuse himself to the nearest soul. The soul of a child. 

The child that was currently dying. 

Blood - crimson and dark - pooled around them. Scarlet stained Shulk’s eyes and clothing, the holes from Metal Face’s claws gaping wide - one in his shoulder, another in his stomach, and another through the meat of his thigh. Shulk’s eyelids fluttered as he desperately tried to seek out his friend’s gazes. He saw Fiora, her leg twisted in the wrong way, in the debris of the Mobile Artillery. He saw Dunban, pulling himself to his feet, leaning on his katana to help him stand. He saw Reyn, his mouth open in a scream that ripped through the air and pierced into the heavens themselves. 

He was having a hard time clinging to the Monado still on the ground. The handle was dark with blood.

Shulk’s eyes fell shut. 

Zanza pushed, gathering up all the ether he could manage and pressed it into Shulk’s stuttering heart. He forced him to hold onto the Monado. He forced him to breathe. 

He forced him to live. 

The future was a fickle thing and the paths it could take were as infinite as the cosmos. 

Zanza just never imagined it could take a turn like this. 

_ How irritating.  _

* * *

There was an intruder in Shulk’s astral plane. 

Zanza more  _ felt  _ the disturbance than  _ saw  _ it. 

He peeled tired eyes open, weakened by the exertion of keeping Shulk alive long enough for the Machina to bring him back from the brink. Vanea knew Shulk was alive. But she did not know Zanza was as well, which rightly explained the presence trying to worm her way into the plane.

Zanza could recognize that presence anywhere. He’d warred against it, changed the world with it. His lip curled in barely hidden disgust. He searched for her, but could not find her. However, he knew she was there. She must have realized the same because the presence drew back. Rebelled. She did not want to be here as much as he did not want her anywhere near his vessel. 

“Meyneth,” he spoke her name. 

“Zanza,” she responded, her voice cold. 

“What brings you here, to my plane?” he sounded weak, a shell of his former tone. Keeping his reckless vessel alive had taken far more out of him than he had bargained for. 

“It is not your plane,” Meyneth responded. “It is this boy’s. What business do you have, latched onto his soul?” 

“To start what you cannot stop,” Zanza responded. “The destruction and recreation of this  _ putrid  _ world  _ you  _ have tainted. And you, Meyneth? Are you no better than I, than to latch and suck the life from one of our beings?” 

“I’m here to complete a mission,” Meyneth responded. “Not to grow my own power.” 

“Then you are weak.” 

“I am no monster like you, Zanza.” 

Zanza chuckled humorlessly. “Your words cut deep, Meyneth.” He imagined her baring her teeth in the way she did when she got angry. She was that way before they became gods and it was a habit that hadn’t died with the rest of her. 

“Find another vessel, Meyneth,” Zanza hissed. He felt her presence bristle with rage. 

“I will save him,” she promised. 

“And what makes you so sure of that?” Zanza sneered. 

“Because he is your greatest enemy,” Meyneth answered. “And your greatest weakness. And I know how much you hate when the future doesn’t go as you have preordained.” 

“ _ Leave!”  _ Zanza all but roared. Meyneth’s presence lingered - Zanza felt a pulse of something he was too weak to investigate - and then she withdrew. The plane was quiet once more. 

* * *

Zanza sensed something wrong as soon as Shulk did. 

Both of them had slumbered for days on end, too exhausted to keep their eyes open to know what was happening to their body. However, it soon became all too apparent what was wrong. 

Zanza, for one, could no longer feel the Monado. It had become a calming presence for the past eighteen years, knowing it was nearby and he could touch it whenever he pleased. But now it was gone, it had been sucked from him. Where had it gone? 

On the other hand, Shulk was now painfully aware the body he was in was no longer his own. Instead, it was armor. Instead, he had been covered head to toe in metal, blue and gold, and crisscrossing his whole body like straps. It ran up his chin, outlined his jaw, and pressed up against the bridge of his eyebrow It was molded to him; a part of him. There was not a single part of him that hadn’t been untouched - un _ tainted _ \- by the metal. 

There was another, horribly prominent detail, however. 

Shulk remembered nothing of who he was. 

He knew his body was wrong. 

He knew where he was, was wrong. 

He knew that what he  _ looked  _ like was wrong. 

But everything else? 

A blurry image. Something lingering just at the back of his memory. For Zanza, it was another complication. Another reality of how fickle the future could be, especially in the hands of a boy so  _ driven  _ to walk not the predetermined path, but one that he carved for himself. And look where it had gotten him - in a machine body, his blood running through the circuits of the Mechon that kept him alive. 

In another life, maybe, Fiora would have been the one in his position. Maybe even she could have been Zanza’s impromptu soul, should the Homs had not uncovered the Monado at Ose. It was certainly one of the branching paths Zanza had seen laid out before him the moment he’d been imprisoned, but the fact remained that she was not. And the truth remained unchanging - Shulk was a Mechon and Zanza was still firmly latched onto his soul. 

_ Irritating.  _

Zanza would have to fight. Fight once more to return Shulk’s memories to him, to get him to retrieve the Monado, and set out on the path preordained for him. He would take Zanza to Mechonis Core where he would get the strength to separate from Shulk and finally,  _ finally  _ bring about the destruction and recreation of the world. 

It was a beautiful image. But it all started with getting Shulk’s memories back. 

It started with little pushes. As Shulk set out on missions under his new moniker -  _ Aqua Face,  _ how garish - Zanza pressed him to ask about the Monado. To ask about his former life. He pressed against the barrier Vanea had made against Shulk’s memories and made cracks. Random things seeped through. Memories of Reyn and Fiora that confused Shulk. It was grueling work - exhausting, even - but Zanza did not give up. He would reap the benefits for his patience and perseverance soon enough.

At least, of course, until the barrier over Shulk’s memories began to crack on its own. 

Shulk saw things during his missions. Things that reminded him of home, of Colony 9. Of the memories he had made there. How he had died. 

Zanza let the rest flow as it may. Perhaps it was a mistake for something that had slipped past, unnoticed. Meyneth’s gift, a failsafe for Shulk once things went south for his lifespan. A blessing - one Zanza had unwittingly given Shulk to mold him into a proper host. And now Meyneth had given her part. Now, all there was to do was wait. Zanza would do most of the work. Shulk would become Zanza’s greatest adversary even if neither of them knew about it. 

_ I will save him,  _ Meyneth had promised. 

_ And what makes you so sure of that?  _

_ Because he is your greatest enemy and your greatest weakness.  _

Of course, now that the blessing - the gift of  _ life _ \- had been properly delivered unto Shulk, all that was left was to open the floodgates.

* * *

There were two things that were needed to form a god. 

First, gifts from the current ones. Zanza had unwittingly bestowed many gifts unto Shulk when he merged their souls. First, the power of foresight. The gift of choice, to allow him to walk the preordained path or carve one of his own. Secondarily, he’d given Shulk the ability to wield a Monado. Something only a godling such as Dunban could do, and even he could only hold it for so long before the ether took something more than his arm. Shulk could hold the Monado, he could wield it, could use it to control patterns of ether in the air. It was an incredible feat, one that was impossible by normal standards, but Zanza had merged himself with the boy’s soul, so he found it as unconcerning as the rest of the gifts he’d unwittingly stitched into Shulk’s Homs soul. Finally, Zanza had given Shulk the gift of life not once, but twice. It was enough for the boy to form his own consciousness, his own personality. It was what made him Homs. It was what started carving Shulk’s Monado piece by piece. 

Meyneth’s gift was much smaller. Miniscule, compared to what Zanza had given, but still just as important. She had given Shulk the power of a will. For where there was a will there was a way. The impossible became possible and with Shulk, he could go even beyond that. He was special even without his slow transformation, the one to forge his own Monado with every step upon the path he carved out. Meyneth believed in him and thus, her own precautions were sent into motion. Her own piece of her soul - her own  _ gift  _ \- embedding itself deep into Shulk’s beating heart. Away from Zanza’s prying eyes, where he could no longer interfere with what she had started. 

The second thing needed in order to create a god was a host - willing or unwilling. Zanza and Meyneth had both carved their forms from flesh and blood when they’d first put together this world but since then, they had created and destroyed many would-be godlings. Dunban was one such godling, Egil another. Both of them were lucky to survive the gifts they’d been given being taken all so suddenly. The host was selected at random, someone worthy of being able to hold the unlimited power of creation. Shulk was anything but worthy, but he was there at the wrong place at the right time and therefore had been molded to become that way. He was a candidate well on his way to godhood, however accidental it was. And, for all the power over the future that Zanza possessed, he had not had to foresight to recognize his own blunder once it had been made. 

* * *

Shulk first felt a push towards the Monado six months into his stay as a Faced Mechon. He’d regained all of the memories Egil had attempted to lock away and Vanea had agreed to keep it a secret. Shulk was a valuable asset, after all, and carried out missions silently and effectively despite everything he’d been taught as a child. Vanea, in return, kept him away from missions that she knew involved the Homs colonies and kept any knowledge of said colonies being attacked away from his ears. 

Shulk was not allowed out his hangar when he was not on missions. Even less than that, he was not allowed out of his unit. He knew what would happen to him; the Mechon was the only thing keeping him alive. If he left for longer than thirty minutes his body would certainly give up on him. No mystery presence would force his heart to beat with varying levels of ether. That much he knew for certain. 

But the Monado called him. It beckoned him closer, asking for him. It seemed to sing, ether trailing down the corridors to where it led. However, every time Shulk blinked to make sure he wasn't seeing things, the cloud of blue dust had vanished, leaving the room just as empty as it was before. The pull tugged stronger every time. Stronger, stronger still. The urge to leave the cockpit wasn’t entirely Shulk’s own and grew with every ignored tug of the Monado’s presence. Perhaps it was the sword itself tugging, pulling, a silent wish upon still lips to come and free it from its prison. Come someday soon, Shulk would not be able to resist its call. 

That someday soon came much sooner than he was expecting. 

It was a yank, an absolutely definitive  _ pull  _ that finally drew Shulk from within the depths of his cockpit. He immediately felt weak, stomach churning, and head spinning without the constant support of his unit. He forced himself to take a wary step forward, watching the glittering blue ether lead him away from the hangar. It did not dissipate when he blinked. 

Shulk began to follow it. 

The halls were empty. There was a distant hum of machinery, of clanks and moans of metal being bent into shapes it was not supposed to go. That was how the Faces were made, after all. Metal melted down to its purest form and then shaped and created to house a living component. Made to use Homs as its motherboard, blood as its circuits. It was the purest form that Shulk - a mechanic at heart - could break it down to understand. 

Shulk trodded down the hallways. His metallic feet clicked ominously, appearing as though he wore boots. He kept his eyes downcast lest he run into anyone, fixed firmly upon the blue ether-like dust leading him further and further into the depths of the fortress. Should anyone catch him, he’d be expelled back to his unit and checked to find issues. He could only hope Vanea would be merciful and allow him to keep his memories of Reyn and Fiora that he’d already been so careless as to forget once. 

He pressed his back to the wall, pausing with bated breath to await any form of security Mechon on their way to his position. He was, after all, breaking every rule in the book to chase after a weapon that was not his own. But the tug inside of him - that  _ voice  _ he’d had his entire life that occurred to him might not have been as normal as he’d been telling himself - urged him to go after the Monado. To claim what had been his for all of thirty minutes before he’d died, flung aside like a ragdoll. 

The hallways were relatively empty despite Shulk’s deeply-rooted anxiety. He felt like an intruder, a lamb within a pack of wolves. He was the one at risk of losing everything here. 

_ Well,  _ Shulk thought grimly, darting across the hallway as a security Mechon clanked away in the opposite direction. The Monado’s blue ether wrapped around him like a cloud.  _ Even if I succeed, I’ll be breaking enough rules to warrant me to be scrapped and remade so let’s just hope I’ve got somewhere to hide it.  _

The blue ether coiled around his waist and tugged, lassoing around Shulk’s hips and yanking. A whine, a silent plea, and Shulk continued down the hallway. 

The ether curled and tugged, snaking around Shulk’s legs and guiding him ever forward. Shulk dearly hoped Egil was not nearby as of today - he would be much less merciful with a punishment should he be the one to find Shulk. Likely, he’d be scrapped and remade and he wasn’t sure that the mysterious presence that had kept him alive could do it a second time. 

Shulk turned another corner, awkwardly sprinting across the open hallway to duck into safety once more. He was hidden from the search beams of the security Mechon here, watching silently and stilling his breathing as one clanked past. In a world past, the sight of it would have terrified Shulk. Now, they were nothing more than a nuisance. 

The Monado’s presence was - for lack of a better word -  _ louder  _ in the back of Shulk’s head. Although, he could have chalked it up to his systems finally beginning to fail and his body finally shutting down after being forcibly reconfigured to be a Mechon Central Nerve Unit, but Shulk was choosing to ignore that. He blinked away the darkness that crept at the edges of his vision, his mental clock informing him he had about fifteen minutes to return to his unit before every organ in his body shut down simultaneously.

He was so  _ close  _ though. He could practically taste the ether in the air, growing more and more potent. He felt oddly excited, the prospect of having a familiar weapon in an unfamiliar hand was oddly comforting. 

Shulk stepped in front of a door and scanned his palm to open it. The ether pooled around it in waves, making Shulk dizzy. 

Ether, like most things, was just as odd as the rest of the world. Too much could kill you; too little could kill you. What a strange concept. Shulk often wondered if it were alive; the way that it curled around him in a shroud, pulling him closer to the Monado only served to make that prospect stronger. 

The door hissed open. It was a dark room, full of weapons Egil had confiscated for reasons that are - and would be - unclear to Shulk. It wasn't surprising that the Monado would be hidden away here - it was the one foil in Egil's seemingly perfect plan. Only Egil's most trusted companions had ever been seen in here and to be in here felt wrong on a fundamental level. He took another step of the room and stumbled, suddenly overwhelmingly dizzy. The ether presence in this room was high - almost dangerously so. It clouded his thoughts, his judgment. His entire mindset remained focused on the Monado. 

He took another unsteady step towards the swords, spotting a sleek red handle among the dull silver ones. He reached out towards it, fingers scraping across the edges as a rush of adrenaline shocked through him. It felt somehow... _ right  _ for him to be holding the sword. He’d only had it for thirty minutes before he’d taken the blow meant for Fiora - how was it that the handle fit so well into the palm of his metal hand? It had been molded and reshaped and he wasn’t even sure there was skin underneath the blue metal. 

_ How odd... _

Shulk turned, Monado in hand, and scampered back to the hangar. Climbing back into his unit was almost like a godsend, feeling the Mechon stabilize his vitals and keep his organs pumping faithfully. His blood merged with Aqua Face - they became one and Shulk remained alive for now. He turned his head, headset bumping against the wall in his small pocket, and observed the Monado that had made itself scarce against the wall of the cockpit. It barely even fit and the blade pressed against Shulk’s legs, but as long as it didn’t activate, he should be safe. 

After all, the Monado could not harm people. 

Even half-machines. 

**Author's Note:**

> Man, I saw so many roleswap things on tumblr and it inspired me to return to the one I wrote like, six-ish months ago. I'm really excited to finally return to this! :D 
> 
> Updates may be slow, but I am planning on returning to this! 
> 
> Hope you enjoyed! Drop a comment if you want to, it would be greatly appreciated And drop into my tumblr [here](https://chocolatechip-master.tumblr.com/) if you wanna or come on down to my writing-focused (mostly Xenoblade-related) blog [here!](https://chocodoesthewriting.tumblr.com/)


End file.
